Congressional Republicans desperately need a civics lesson. A normal, functioning Congress is comprised of the House of Representatives and the Senate, which work together to occasionally create bills designed to maybe help our country and respond to the needs of its citizens. If a majority of the members of the House (and usually the Senate) vote in favor of a bill, it goes to the president who can sign it into law or veto it. Congress can, however, override a veto with a two-thirds majority.
This is how the legislative branch works and that has not changed. In fact, it's about as simple as "Schoolhouse Rock!," but for some reason, a substantial amount of Congress cannot grasp an idea that many children thoroughly understand.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, popularly known as "Obamacare," is a law. This seems relatively important, so it is worth repeating – the health care reform law was passed by Congress and signed into law in March of 2010 following the same procedure as any other bill.
For some reason, Republicans don't seem to get that, or maybe they simply don't want to accept it. They think perhaps if they close their eyes and click their ruby red slippers together, it might just disappear. There was also a substantial repeal effort that fell short when the Supreme Court upheld the Affordable Care Act in June of 2012 on the basis that the federal government has the power to tax.
The last possible chance of ridding the country of the law was shot down on Nov. 6, 2012 when, despite a similar theme of conservatives closing their eyes and ears to most polling data and wishfully ignoring the imminent reality, President Obama was handily re-elected.
Another wonderful contradiction in this alternative universe is that the persistent effort to repeal the law would fail in the Democratically-controlled Senate and would – let's say more than likely – be vetoed by the president who bears the colloquial name of the law. In fact, the party of so-called fiscal responsibility has voted over 40 times to repeal the law, which has cost taxpayers over $55 million.
One might find this civic misunderstanding to be puzzling; the Tea Party is supposed to champion and defend the Constitution, but appears never to have read it.
So of course it is natural to expect that some buffoon like Ted Cruz, a Republican Texas Senator, would pull a political stunt like a pseudo-filibuster and try to defund the health care law at the risk of causing the federal government to default on its debt. His silly yet damaging antics are not necessarily worth mentioning, but it is important to make the distinction that the guy just stood up and talked for a really long time.
There was a specified ending time to his rambling and he wasn't really filibustering to stop any legislation from passing. He was simply indulging the wet dreams of Tea Party conservatives who live in another dimension where they can get their way while ignoring anyone who disagrees with them.
The problem here is not the threat of a long-term government shutdown or even the conservative media promoting nonsensical actions like a false filibuster. The problem is that one of only two major political parties in America does not base its actions and decisions in reality.If issues like unemployment, failing schools, insufficient environmental regulation and international conflict are to be solved, there needs to be at least two healthy political parties that embrace reality and work together to improve it.
For the past few years, there has been only one such party.
The reality is that in the United States, there is a centrist party, a right-wing party and a gang of crypto-fascist thugs that prevent reasonable discourse and lack the ability to respond to very serious problems our country faces.
Perhaps shifting the conversation away from the issues and toward the bizarre is exactly what the Republicans aim to do.
They certainly don't have any new ideas of their own that are widely supported by Americans. Maybe reading "Green Eggs and Ham" is a better alternative to admitting that they are out of ideas and are at risk of becoming irrelevant. Until they realize this, we can only expect further bizarre monologues and collective delusion from Capitol Hill.
Online Editor Ross Fogg is a College senior from Fayetteville, Ga.
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